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We have heard and read so much about how important the person of the Holy Spirit is to the believer. As a matter of fact, the Christian life would have been tiring, boring and lack substance without the person of the Holy Spirit. So, it is the person of the Holy Spirit that gives our Christian life and walk the necessary substance that it requires. When we became born again, the Holy Spirit came and indwell us. Ephesians 1:3-14 says:
“In Him you also trusted, after you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation; in whom also, having believed, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, 14 who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, to the praise of His glory.”
A seal is a symbol of originality, security and authenticity. When the Holy Spirit comes to indwell us, He became out true certification that we belong to God and to the kingdom of God. 2 Timothy 2:19 says: “Nevertheless the solid foundation of God stands, having this seal: “The Lord knows those who are His,” and, “Let everyone who names the name of Christ depart from iniquity.” So, when God looks down from heaven, He identifies you as His child because He can see the Holy Spirit resident in you.
Listen to Podcast: The Three-fold Ministry of The Holy Spirit to the Unsaved World
The Unsaved World
The unsaved world refers to that portion of the world that have not accepted Christ as their personal Lord and Savior. Sometimes I ask myself: Is it possible for the whole world to accept the Lordship of Christ and confess Him as their Lord and savior? Even though my human mind sometimes tells me, “it is not possible”, but with God it is not an impossibility. Why? Because God has made provision for it and has concluded it that the world must confess the Lordship of Jesus.
The ministry of the Holy Spirit to the unsaved world is borne out of the fact that God does not want any man to perish. In 2 Peter 3:9 and Titus 2:11-15, the Bible says: “The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.”
“For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men, 12 teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age, 13 looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, 14 who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify for Himself His own special people, zealous for good works. 15 Speak these things, exhort, and rebuke with all authority. Let no one despise you.”
The ministry of the Holy Spirit to the unsaved world would be manifested in three areas: sin, righteousness and judgment. And when Jesus was about leaving the scene, He said to His disciples that He would go away and send the Holy Spirit. And apart from the fact that the Holy Spirit is for believers, the unsaved world would also have a feel of Him, not that He would indwell them (because the world cannot receive Him [John 14:17]) as He is indwelling believers, but His ministry to the unsaved world would be manifested in three folds.
5 “But now I go away to Him who sent Me, and none of you asks Me, ‘Where are You going?’ 6 But because I have said these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart. 7 Nevertheless I tell you the truth. It is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I depart, I will send Him to you. 8 And when He has come, He will convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment: 9 of sin, because they do not believe in Me; 10 of righteousness, because I go to My Father and you see Me no more; 11 of judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged.
John 16:5-11
The first thing you would notice here is that Jesus didn’t say the Holy Spirit would convict the believers. The Holy Spirit does not convict believers. The word “convict” is a legal term which means that a person has been found guilty of a crime and such is condemned to prison or death. If you look at this viz-a-viz what the Scripture says in Romans 8:1-2: There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit, For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. It then presupposes that a believer who walks according to the Spirit is not exposed to any form of condemnation or conviction of sin from the same Holy Spirit because there is nothing to be convicted of. Because when you become born again, there is a Spirit-life that you must live through the help of the Holy Spirit and as long as you are living that life, there is no sin consciousness in you anymore.
What then does the Holy Spirit do in the life of a believer?
John 14:26, John 16:13 and Hebrews 10:15-17 shows us: “But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you.” So here, we see scripturally that the Holy Spirit would play the role of a helper and teacher in the life of a believer and not a ‘convictor’. Let us go to John 16:13 to see the other leg. “However, when He, the Spirit of truth, has come, He will guide you into all truth; for He will not speak on His own authority, but whatever He hears He will speak; and He will tell you things to come.” Did we see that? The Holy Spirit guides us (the believers) and not convicts or condemn us. The Holy Spirit guides us into the truth of who we are now in Christ Jesus: that we are no longer sinners, that we have been made righteous, that we are blameless before Him, that we have been justified by His works, that we are free from sin, and that the righteous nature of God that we have will enable us to live a holy and pleasing life unto God the Father.
“But the Holy Spirit also witnesses to us; for after He had said before,16 “This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, says the Lord: I will put My laws into their hearts, and in their minds, I will write them,” 17 then He adds, “Their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more.” Here, the Bible shows us that the Holy Spirit witnesses to us (or bears witness with our spirit) that God has forgiven us of all sins and that we can come before Him boldly.
If we go ahead to believe that the Holy Spirit convict believers of sin, then we should ask ourselves whether we are truly born again or whether we have truly abandoned the things of the world because the moment the Holy Spirit comes to indwell you, He is meant to be guiding you and not convicting you. The moment you sense it that you are being convicted, that means you have a property of conviction within you.
What does it connote: that the Holy Spirit will convict the world of Sin?
Notice Jesus didn’t say the Holy Spirit will convict the world of sins, but of sin. What exactly is that sin? Verse 9 shows us: “because they do not believe in Me” it is the sin of unbelief. It is the sin of unbelief that would ultimately lead people to condemnation. John 3:18-19 says: “He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. 19 And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.”
Jude 1:14-15 also shows us this in a more beautiful context.
Now Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about these men also, saying, “Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousand of His saints, 15 to execute judgment on all, to convict all who are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have committed in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him.”
What does it connote: that the Holy Spirit will convict the world of righteousness?
Now, there is the righteousness that is of this world, and there is God’s kind of righteousness that came through the finished works of Christ. The world always wants to measure up by their own righteousness, but this will not go anywhere with God. Isaiah 64:6 says:
But we are all like an unclean thing,
And all our righteousnesses are like filthy rags;
We all fade as a leaf,
And our iniquities, like the wind,
Have taken us away.
When God is going to judge the world, He would judge the world based on the righteousness that is of Christ, and not the self-righteousness of this world.
The righteousness that is of this world does not commend people to God. It does not make us acceptable as well in the sight of God. Luke 18:9-14 shows us:
“Also, He spoke this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others: 10 “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 11 The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, ‘God, I thank You that I am not like other men—extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector. 12 I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I possess.’ 13 And the tax collector, standing afar off, would not so much as raise his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me a sinner!’ 14 I tell you; this man went down to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”
Apostle Paul also wrote to the Jews about self-righteousness in Romans 10:1-4 and Galatians 2:15-16 this way:
“Brethren, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they may be saved. 2 For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. 3 For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and seeking to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted to the righteousness of God. 4 For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.”
“We who are Jews by nature, and not sinners of the Gentiles, 16 knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law but by faith in Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law; for by the works of the law no flesh shall be justified.”
So, the Holy Spirit would convict the world of righteousness because they have failed to accept the righteousness that is of God that came through Christ Jesus.
…. of judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged
Satan is the ruler of this world and he has been judged from the foundation of the world because of his rebellion. There is no repentance for him whatsoever because his fate has been signed, sealed and concluded. The devil has been doomed for everlasting destruction, him and his angels. Matthew 25:41 says: “Then He will also say to those on the left hand, ‘Depart from Me, you cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels…”
But as many that would not accept Jesus as their Lord and savior would end up with Satan, and this is not the plan of God for such people. Satan has been judged, and there is no need for you to go down with him and that is why God made a way though salvation that Christ brought. This is why apostle Paul wrote to the Corinthians (2 Corinthians 5:11) that “knowing therefore the terror of the Lord, we persuade all men…”
The Role of Believers in Making the Ministry of the Holy Spirit Seamless
– The preaching of the Gospel
And this is why we cannot but preach the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ because if we don’t, there is no way the Holy Spirit would be able to convict the world of sin. The responsibility is on all of us who have believed to preach the gospel so that we can make this work easy for the Holy Spirit to do. This is why we talk about partnering with the Holy Spirit so that this gospel of the kingdom can be preached to the ends of the earth. Romans 10:14-15 and Mark 16:15-16
“How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? 15 And how shall they preach unless they are sent? As it is written: “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the gospel of peace,
Who bring glad tidings of good things!”
“And He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned.”
– By Preserving the Legacy of the Kingdom of God on Earth
It is the responsibility of believers to preserve every of God’s institution on earth. A believer should never at any point in time be seen destroying the legacy of the kingdom but rather, upholding and preserving it. Matthew 5:13-16 says:
“You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt loses its flavor, how shall it be seasoned? It is then good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men. 14 “You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden. 15 Nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. 16 Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.”
– By Living An Exemplary Life in The World
“Likewise, exhort the young men to be sober-minded, 7 in all things showing yourself to be a pattern of good works; in doctrine showing integrity, reverence, incorruptibility, 8 sound speech that cannot be condemned, that one who is an opponent may be ashamed, having nothing evil to say of you.
Titus 2:6-8
Article Source: [Centre for New Dimension Leadership]
